The present invention relates to archery bow stabilizers, and more particularly, to archery bow stabilizers that counter movement of the archery bow when the bow is held, drawn and/or shot by an archer.
When an arrow is shot from an archery bow, a variety of translational and rotational movements occur around the location where an archer grips the archery bow, that is, the archery bow grip. These movements can affect the accuracy and the range of the arrow shot from the bow. Generally, the movement about the gripping location are divided into three different movements, namely, pitch, roll and yaw. Pitch occurs when the bow moves up or down from the perspective of an archer drawing or holding the bow. Roll occurs when the bow rotates clockwise or counter-clockwise, while in the archer's hand, from the point of view of the archer drawing the bow. Yaw generally relates to hand torque, where the bow has a tendency to wobble from side-to-side, or left-to-right, about the bow grip from the perspective of an archer drawing or holding the bow.
A variety of archery bow stabilizers are available which attempt to counter pitch, roll and yaw movement. Generally, these stabilizers are weighted and project forwardly from the riser of the bow. Many of these stabilizers are in the form of a cylindrical weighted rod that projects forwardly several inches from the riser. The construction of stabilizers varies, depending on the application. For example, stabilizers used on hunting bows are generally small and compact to enable a bow hunter to adequately maneuver the archery bow in a hunting situation. Stabilizers used for competitive shooting, where there are not space constraints, tend to be rather large.
There are a variety of rather large archery competition stabilizers that include a central rod with additional secondary bars that extend outwardly at an obtuse angle away from the central rod to counter roll, yaw and/or pitch. Some other competition stabilizers include mechanisms to provide adjustment to the structure of the stabilizer, and thus its ability to precisely address roll, pitch and yaw. For example, one type of stabilizer includes a mounting bracket that projects outwardly from opposite sides of the archery bow. Rotatable bars are attached at the ends of the bracket, and rotate to various positions so the mass of the stabilizer bow can be redistributed based on the preferences of the archer.
Most competition stabilizers are designed to include opposing weights or bars on opposite (left and right) sides of the bow to generally balance the bow and prevent it from excessive roll, as well as other movement. In general, the stabilizers attempt to self-balance the archery bow as it is held at the bow grip by the archer.
Another, different type of stabilizer is a counter stabilizer, which includes a single stabilizer bar mounted to a bracket that is mounted to the riser of the bow. The stabilizer bar is generally mounted on the opposite side of a bow from another weighty archery accessory, for example, a bow site or an arrow quiver. The counter-balancing stabilizer includes a mounting bracket that projects only to one side of the bow (opposite the side of the bow on which the counter-balanced archery accessory is mounted), and a weighted stabilizer rod. While these constructions can counter-balance other accessories, it can be less suitable for archery bows where there are no relatively heavy accessories, or where the archer simply desires to better balance their bow and prevent the roll, pitch and yaw movements as described above.
While there are a variety of stabilizers on the market that provide specialized balancing and counter balancing of certain bow accessories, there remains room for improvement for an all-purpose archery bow stabilizer that reduces or eliminates external asymmetric forces which can induce torque or instability in an archery bow.